GAA: Arnold adamant on release of Croke Park figures

JOHN ARNOLD, one of the critics of GAA President Sean Kelly at last weekend’s Cork County Convention, is holding out for a full breakdown of the financial figures for opening Croke Park on big-match days.

Revealing that he had received a letter from Mr Kelly in midweek in response to what he had said about him at the convention the Bride Rovers clubman said it did not contain the information that he was looking for.

"I am not talking about this as a personal insult," he said. "It's about the figures not being available to the Cork County Board (of which he is a member) and every county board as was promised at a meeting of the Central Council earlier in the year."

While saying that he did not regret his criticism of Mr Kelly (for not replying to his letter), he said he accepted his explanation that he received hundreds of letters every week and did not get his particular one.

"I had written to him on another matter, about stewarding in Croke Park, and he responded to that."

He said he had been disappointed at the level of negativity generated in the media by the debate where his remarks and others made at the convention had been 'all mixed into the one cake'.

"And 'the cake' is that everybody down in Cork is against soccer and against rugby," he said.

"Before I made my remarks about the president I said that we would probably be called backwoods men, conservatives and this and that. And that is basically what they have done. People haven't addressed the pros and cons (of opening Croke Park) at all. They have just attacked the people who are against opening it."